Urban Legends - Final Cut
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Movie Reviews of Urban Legends - Final Cut
Movie Review: A Perfect Sequel
Summary: 5 Stars
i loved this movie
it is the entry in the urban legend series
i love every single urban legend so much
i recommended this movie highly!
Movie Review: Urban Legends- Final Cut
Summary: 5 Stars
I loved urban legends- final cut Because It was a awesome Movie to watch with your Friends if into scary Movies.Movie Review: Solid slasher, wrong series?
Summary: 4 Stars
Solid slasher, wrong series? This film was panned by many, yet for a genre film I think it's a lot better than the original Urban Legend.
A film school class are all competing for the prestigious Hitchcock Award, which is regarded as a golden key to Hollywood for the student who wins it. However, when the cast and crew of a coveted student film begin dying, and someone switches the film on the credits, it's clear that someone wants the award very, very badly.
Admittedly, the final payoff--the identity of the killer and his plan--doesn't make the most sense. (How would the killer honestly expect to get away with it?) However, a few elements made it very entertaining. One is the film within a film setup, and the numerous references to film. This is not the same thread that ran through the Scream series, though. The characters here are less aware of the conventions of the slasher film, and the murders are not always the typical " 'Are you there?' [splat!] " setup.
The only element, strangely enough, that the original Urban Legend has over The Final Cut is the urban legend piece itself. There aren't enough famous urban legends left to use in this one since many--the killer in the backseat, the killer calling from inside the house, the killer in the dark room--were used in the original. The Final Cut does have the 'waking up in a bathtub full of ice cubes to find your kidneys missing' one. That shows up here in a very bloody, demented, and tense scene early on. It was stylish and twisted, and a good slasher kill. Other than that, yes, people die, but not in 'urbgan legend' ways. Which is fine, because the body count is decent, and the killer sports a much snappier gettup than the original film's 'massive parka-clad slasher'. One kill in particular owes a lot to Peeping Tom, and it's a nice touch (the voyeur view kill) as the class watches what they think are the dailies from the protagonist's student horror film. It plays with the whole standard of seeing through the killer's eyes and the 'gaze' and power of sight afforded other characters.
There's also at least one electrocution, always welcome, and a man beaten with a camera lens, very self-reflexive.
The director is John Ottman, who is actually a composer, and he contributes a very capable score as well. (Some of his music was also featured in H20.) The only real link to the first film is through Reese Wilson, the school security guard from the original who finds herself at another college where the same old same old is happening. Hart Bochner returns to slasherdom (having been in the 1980 Terror Train) as a film prof.
The DVD is very good. We get a featurette, deleted scenes, trailers, and even a gag reel, which is amusing for a horror film and is a good touch (you watch flubbed takes and botched stunts.)
The film has a decent gore factor and a decent whodunit. It's stylish, and more than serviceable in the genre. Recommended.
Movie Review: A horror movie within a horror movie
Summary: 4 Stars
Urban Legends Final Cut is a movie about a movie, basically, and this little twist to the classic horror formula plays out rather well. At the country's most distinguished (albeit weird) film-making school, the Hitchcock Award for best student movie is the ultimate accomplishment, all but guaranteeing the winner a quick jump to a directing chair in Hollywood. The protagonist, Amy, decides to break away from her documentary roots and produce a horror movie, one in which a serial killer patterns his murders on urban legends. When Travis, arguably the school's most gifted student, receives a low grade on his film, he takes his own life. He is only the first character to die. As Amy begins filming her own movie, several of her fellow students are murdered, and eventually the killer comes after her. For the most part, this is standard horror material. The idea of murdering people in the manner of urban legends is pretty cool, although the pattern seems to degrade from this path toward the end. The identity of the killer is not overly shocking, but the producers do a pretty good job of keeping the viewer guessing up until the end. The final scene was a little weird and confusing, but, all in all, the plot held up rather well from beginning to end. In terms of the horror quotient, I would not classify this movie as particularly scary. There is a masked killer chasing people down and killing them, but there's nothing here to make you jump out of your seat. The special effects are pretty good, and there is a nice variety to be found in the manner of the murders (which does include one beheading, which is something no horror film should be without). The movie has its lighter side, as well, obviously not taking itself too seriously. The projected image of the film-making school is basically a parody of itself, and the antics of the two set design students produce some good laughs. The movie could be considered rather Scream-like, but it has enough character of its own to succeed in its own right.
The special features on the DVD are both good and bad. The inclusion of seven deleted scenes is nice and provides further insight into the mindset of the characters as well as the story itself. The gag reel contains some funny bloopers and other moments not included in the final print. The "making of featurette" is rather disappointing, however; it does feature some interviews with a good number of cast members, but it provides little insight into the actual making of the movie.
All told, this is a better-than-average slasher film, mixing in good acting, great special effects, and an actual storyline that doesn't reveal its most important secrets until the very end. I personally would have liked to see more gore, but the horror lover in me did find much enjoyment in watching this film.
Movie Review: "Splice-&-Dice"
Summary: 4 Stars
* Based on the reviews I read before deciding to purchase this DVD, I expected "Urban Legends: Final Cut" to be a rip-off of the "Scream" trilogy ... And, to my great pleasure, It wasn't.
Also, based on the reviews I read before deciding to purchase this DVD, I expected "Urban Legends: Final Cut" (a.k.a. "Urban Legend 2") to be an original and entirely independent project (not a rehash/continuation of the "first" movie of the same name) ... And, to my great pleasure, It was.
It is not really possible to compare the two films and say emphatically that one was superior to the other, since, other than the Title, the [quote] return [unquote] of Loretta Devine's security officer character, and the concept of brutal murders being based on popular urban legends, the two films really have no connection with each other.
This is what I was hoping for, because I couldn't be able to stand the idea of a continuation of a story that made little to no sense to me. Not to say that "UL-1" was not an enjoyable movie storywise, but I ended up hating it because they overplayed the "winter coat" angle of story to such a ridiculous extent that it fell by the wayside as being way too forcably contrived and disingenuous.
Fortunately, "UL-2" played it more straight and made its stalker dozens of times more believable, though not quite as menacing. And apart from the grizzly "kidney operation" sequence near the beginning of the film, I thoroughly enjoyed the refreshing break that this particular "slasher film" had to offer by playing it more for chills and suspense rather than for the typical gratuitous blood, guts and gore.
The "movie within a movie" concept was equally effective, keeping the viewer guessing constantly-- even right down to the very last moments of the movie --about what was taking place and how it all fit together.
Admittedly, this film can't come even close to touching any of the "Scream" movies, but it is still a compelling and coherent suspense-thriller with a number of (occasionally humorous) twists and turns which make for an enjoyable-- though not extraordinarily scary --edge-of-the-seat ride that's well worth the price of purchase.